These weekend’s shows from Amherst were split down the middle. Phish brought a legitimate smoker on Saturday night and a bona fide snoozefest on Sunday. Coming off three special shows in Augusta, Utica, and Providence, however, these shows just didn’t elevate in the same way. The first night has plenty of engaging jamming in “Tweezer,” Disease > My Friend > Caspian > Halfway to the Moon > Boogie On,” and set-ending sequence – “Piper > Hood, YEM.” But aside from the first-set “Stash,” Sunday never really got off the ground. The old-school first set would have been fine had there been any action in the second. But there wasn’t. When a second set’s highlight is “Roggae > Taste” you know something strange is afoot at the Circle K. Another smoking “Bowie” could do nothing to salvage this long-lost second half. But the band popped right back in Manchester like nothing had happened.
I: Meatstick, Party Time, Golgi Apparatus, Kill Devil Falls, Tweezer, Lawn Boy, Sparkle, Big Black Furry Creature from Mars, Hold Your Head Up > Love You > Hold Your Head Up, Possum, Tweezer Reprise
II: Down with Disease > My Friend, My Friend> Prince Caspian> Halfway to the Moon > Boogie On Reggae Woman > Maze, Wading in the Velvet Sea, Piper > Harry Hood, You Enjoy Myself
A standout, late second-set segment of Saturday night’s UMass show.
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VIDEOS OF THE WEEKEND:
“Tweezer” 10.23.10 II – Amherst, MA (MKDevo)
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.10″Camel Walk” 10.24.10 I – Amherst, MA (MKDevo)
DOWNLOADS OF THE WEEKEND: These weekend’s shows from Amherst were split down the middle. Phish brought a legitimate smoker on Saturday night and a bona fide snoozefest on Sunday. Coming off three special shows in Augusta, Utica, and Providence, however, these shows just didn’t elevate in the same way. The first night has plenty of …
Poster collecting has gotten crazy in the Phish scene these days. These sought-after, limited edition prints often go on sale exactly when doors open, if not hours beforehand outside the venue, all but eliminating the chance for the casual concert-goer to grab one. And hence the allure. Even the nights that all the posters are sold at merch stands when doors open, they are sold out before the show begins, and if the print is a Pollock, its a race to the tables and they are gone in minutes. The aftermarket for this artwork has also blossomed with the $50 prints grabbing up to $200 in the post-tour hype, and even more on EBay. Hiring a different artist for every show or run this Fall, Phish offered a diversity of prints to take home as a souvenir or an investment. Artwork is subjective, and everyone has their own tastes, but these are my five favorite prints from Fall Tour 2010. (Pictures of all prints can be found on Phish’s Facebook page under “Photos”)
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5. 10/30 Atlantic City – Artist: Nate Duval (Run of 550)
The middle print of a three-piece holiday set, this one stands out from the rest. Celebrating the honey bee – the state bug of New Jersey – this Queen Beehive with a seeing eye struck me the moment I saw it. While the other two prints in the series are also very cool, the surrounding patterns and bizarre visual effect of this image put it over the top.
10/30 (Duval)
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4. 10/26 Manchester, NH – Artist: Ken Taylor (Run of 600)
This print plays off Western Observatory in Derryfield Park, an actual landmark in Manchester, New Hampshire. Artist, Ken Taylor, dropped in on the forum at Phishposters.com saying that his intent for the image was to have the tree symbolize Phish taking over Manchester. Well, Ken’s premonition proved to be on point as Phish took the New Hampshire town by storm.This fairly dark and mysterious print pops to life in person with the use of metallic inks; not your run of the mill Phish poster
10/26 (Ken Taylor)
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3. 10/24 Amherst, MA – Artist: Jim Pollock (Run of 625)
This Pollock print for the second night of Amherst trumps his work on the first by leaps and bounds. Centered on a crest in which each quadrant represents a band member, the words “Boy, Man, God, Shit” surround the central image. Another single – or third – eye appears over the top of the print in the “Phish” font, a theme present on three separate prints this tour. Pollack combined a colonial scene with an underwater theme below the date, as colonists and their horse appear in full snorkel gear. This brightly colored print bursts with detail and has been a pricey purchase in the secondary market.
This is easily the most detailed print from Fall Tour. Blending an underwater scene with an intricately designed forest, eleven squid cling to an ark at dusk. Jellyfish, sea stars, seahorses (fuckin’ love em!) and other detailed pieces from under the sea surround them in a print that only gets more interesting the more you look at it. Probably many people’s pick for the poster of tour, this one is a visual treat.
10/22 (Marq Spusta)
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1. 10/19 Augusta, ME – Artist: Scott Cambpell(Run of 700)
Augusta’s poster is my personal favorite due to its sharp, borderline-animated artwork, dramatic shape, and vibrant colors. Scott Campbell’s pieces have always struck a chord with me, and when I saw this print it immediately caught my eye. Alluding to “Cavern,” the poster includes the lryic “It’s later than you think” above the date of the show. The image portrays light shafts beaming into a cave onto a mud rat detector, or some sort of projector, under a ceiling dripping with stalagtites that spell “Phish.” Aside from any Phishy symbolism, this piece struck me as the boldest and most powerful artwork from of Fall Tour.
A start-to-finish smoker, the second show of tour provided a huge step forward from night one. The first – and arguably – more exciting set featured a classic “Jim,” “Foam” opener, and a stellar sequence of “Wolfmans,” “Reba,” “Halley’s > Tweezer.” The highlight of this run was “Reba,” a version that would be sitting on the tour’s top-shelf were it not for Augusta’s masterpiece. The set-opening triumvirate of “Golden Age > Piper > Camel Walk” and a late set “Twist” starred in the second half. But no matter how many times Phish tries it, “Number Line” just doesn’t work as a set closer.
I: Runaway Jim, Foam, Back on the Train, Wolfman’s Brother, Reba, Halley’s Comet > Tweezer, What Things Seem*, The Squirming Coil, Run Like an Antelope
II: Golden Age > Piper > Camel Walk, Alaska, Gotta Jibboo, Wading in the Velvet Sea, Twist, Fluffhead, Backwards Down the Number Line
Poster collecting has gotten crazy in the Phish scene these days. These sought-after, limited edition prints often go on sale exactly when doors open, if not hours beforehand outside the venue, all but eliminating the chance for the casual concert-goer to grab one. And hence the allure. Even the nights that all the posters are …
Fall tour contained more musical highlights than I can discuss in one post, but we’ve got plenty of time. Every week before the Holiday Run, I will spotlight a couple standout pieces from tour that haven’t been discussed in other articles. Today, we start with three. (Click the song title to download each selection.)
This exploratory entree of Colorado’s tour opener was delivered amidst the first “Mike’s Groove” of fall. Despite a solid first-set “Stash,” this “Ghost” brought Phish’s first real improvisational odyssey of the season. Progressing through several distinct sections of jamming, this multi-dimensional version started with Mike taking both the rhythmic and melodic leads, as Trey wove his minimalism around Gordon’s foundation. Emerging slowly within a melodic and groovy jam, Trey eventually wound up at the front of the pack, bushwhacking musical territory side by side with Mike. Offering abstract leads over a rolling beat that continued to gather momentum, Trey merged with both Mike and Page in a soaring tri-colored peak segment. On came Mike’s envelope filter, upping the overall juice, as Trey reached for the top in a dramatic climb. But after the band arrived at the climax, they didn’t bail for the next song. Instead, Phish rode a familiar-sounding, descending pattern down the back side of the mountain, landing in a sparse and fully connected whole-band groove. Getting into the funkiest section of this “Ghost,” Page offered a organ solo that led the music into a series of staccato hits that were soon encompassed by the ambient jaws of the Phish. This final shift transformed the piece into an awesome space-aged experiment.
After Phish played a verse of “Whole Lotta Love” within “Chalk Dust” in the 30th’s first set, the ploy could have gone either way. Perhaps the band was hinting at their chosen album, but more likely than not, they were poking fun at the hype around Led Zeppelin. But the band answered that question loud and clear in the second set when they got their Led out amidst the a twisting and turning last “Tweezer” of fall. Dropping into the jam, Phish immediately broke into a hard-nosed tease of “Whole Lotta Love.” But as Trey tore into his “Tweezer” solo, drenched with a hardcore vibe, it seemed Phish would launch into a super-charged jam. But their prank had hardly begun. Within no time, Trey brought the band into another Zeppelin anthem, “Heartbreaker,” fully crooning the first verse over the band’s interpretation. Dropping back into “Tweezer” for its most extensive mini-segment, the band had just entered a beautiful melodic framework when they dissolved into “Ramble On.” With each Zeppelin song came tidal waves of energy seething through Boardwalk Hall – easily the biggest surges of the weekend. Blasting the old-school structure with classic rock and roll, Phish had the crowd eating out of their hand like a puppy. Instead of Page, who killed the song back in ’98 at Vernon Downs, Trey sang “Ramble On,” not quite doing the piece justice. But this “Tweezer to Heaven” wasn’t about sharp musicianship, it was about energy, adrenaline, and unadulterated fun. Before stepping into the transcendent guitar solo of “Ramble On,” Page exchanged a joking look with Trey while he played the beginning of Zeppelin’s ballad, “Thank You;” and the band moved from one melodic song to another. Dropping back into “Tweezer” for only a moment, before anyone knew what had hit them, Phish was in the iconic final verse of “Stairway to Heaven.” One couldn’t help but laugh along with their musical gamesmanship as the Phish toyed with the audience while creating a spirited medley of Zeppelin classics; quite an enjoyable trick on the eve of the treat. And as we walked out of the venue that night, the 24-hour guessing guessing game commenced with Led Zeppelin crossed off the list.
With much-deserved praise going to the interstellar “Stash” from Halloween, the precursor to the holiday version came a week before in Amherst. And if Atlantic City’s version never happened, we’d all be talking how the Mullins “Stash” was the best of this era. Engaging in a dueling leadership from note one, Mike and Trey commanded the onset of this voyage as Fishman’s beats morphed into the effervescent percussion of lore. Trey’s leads began to encompass a melodic theme, pushing Page to join step up his piano work – a defining facet of this excursion. The band shifted into a major key, and the vicious textures transformed into rolling pastures as Trey’s melodic run never relented for a millisecond in some of his most impressive work of tour. While Trey signed his name backwards and forwards on this piece with numbing, non-stop leads, the rest of the band fully engaged in a crushing musical passage of the highest degree. Pushing and pulling the tension beneath Trey’s wizardry, the whole band played in sync, crafting a new-school, top-shelf version. Page’s piano work emerged as a highlight of this “Stash,” providing a retro feel in the retro venue. Reentry into “Stash’s” final build happened seamlessly and with roaring whole-band passion. Without a thought of hesitation, Phish narrated a cooperative tale of super-glued psychedelia.
This third-song appearance of “Vultures” was the first signpost along the road at Utica that pointed to special night. A smoking rendition, rarely do bust-outs come off the shelf with such zest.
Fall tour’s opener contained the typical event-less warm-up set before the band put together a somewhat choppy second half that had some serious highlights. “Ghost” brought exploratory jamming while a top-shelf “Slave” made an powerful mid-set exclamation. Solid versions of “Mike’s” and “Weekapaug,” and a seemingly out-of-place debut of “My Problem Right There,” filled out the moments of note.
I: Chalk Dust Torture, Ocelot, It’s Ice, Bouncing Around the Room, Funky Bitch, AC/DC Bag, NICU, The Moma Dance, Horn, Stash, Golgi Apparatus
II: Mike’s Song > Simple > Ghost > Weekapaug Groove, Fee, Makisupa Policeman, My Problem Right There*> Makisupa Policeman, Slave to the Traffic Light, Strange Design, Julius
Fall tour contained more musical highlights than I can discuss in one post, but we’ve got plenty of time. Every week before the Holiday Run, I will spotlight a couple standout pieces from tour that haven’t been discussed in other articles. Today, we start with three. (Click the song title to download each selection.) *** …
A fall tour that spoke to fans new and old fused Phish’s musical styles past and present, forming a hybrid sound that seems to have caught everyone’s ear. Throughout their career, Phish’s music has always grown and changed as the band built upon their past while adding new ideas to the mix. Moving from one year to the next, some elements remained while others were replaced as Phish forged a protean path. A year and a half into their comeback, Fall 2010 transformed Phish from a band on the rise into one that had risen again. And coupled with the defining tour of this era came a new sound of Phish – a musical palette founded in their mid-’90s precision and intensity while laced with the modern style and approach of a mature band on the horizon of a golden age.
If we were to draw lines from this era of Phish music to its closest direct influence, I’d think we’d find an overlap between the years of 1993-1995 – an era that many cite as Phish’s finest. And what better time to use as a current reference point than an era when the band jammed with rabid creativity. Living and breathing their craft in totality, Phish rarely made technical mistakes during this era of drill bit focus, and their jams took a directed route into the heart of the matter. Though Phish’s style morphed through varying incarnations within these years, the band expressed a certain urgency behind their music as if they were playing for their lives. Now, fifteen years removed from the first era of prime Phish, the band sounds more like their mid-’90s selves than ever.
10.31.10 (Dave Lavery)
After their transition to arenas in 1996 and the cowfunk revolution of 1997, Phish music diverted from this mid-’90s style for the duration of their career. Moving into the era of groove from 1997-1999, Phish infused slowed-down, collaborative textures and abstract soundscapes into their bag of tricks as their sound transformed altogether. Phish reinvented themselves during the late ’90s, morphing into a larger-than-life groove monster and closing out the final years of the millennium focused on rhythmic and ambient styles of play. Many older fans grew disenchanted with the band’s direction during this period, while many new fans hopped on the train as Phish shows blossomed into outright psychedelic dance events. Exploring varying versions of this groove-based style through their initial hiatus in 2000, the band rode this wave to the second peak of their career between the years of ’97 and ’99.
Now, as Phish steps into the onset of their next peak era, they liken a vintage wine ripened with age. Able to pull from any part of their prolific career at any time, while simultaneously forging a new sonic path to the future, Phish has more in their repertoire than ever before. Their ensemble approach to modern jamming – a lead-less conversation between four seasoned players – suggests a new application to a paradigm of old. The music of Fall Tour sounded like a legitimate hybrid between the intensity and directness old and the fluid, mature communication style of now – a stunning combination when all goes well. And as the road of fall progressed, things went well far more often than not.
10.31.10 (Dave Lavery)
In a significant step forward, this tour was devoid of excessive sloppiness and aimless jamming; each night Phish had a plan and executed it. Whether or not their plan was to your or my liking was a separate issue all together. Most times when they dove into a jam, they swam out successfully with glowing results. Regardless of what song they played, it genuinely felt like the band was in the moment for each night of tour, another parallel to the Phish of old. As whole-band communication became subconscious again, segues slithered seamlessly and jams jumped down your throat like juggernauts. Anchored in their mid-’90s peak while firmly planted in the present, Phish music became the best of both worlds.
They say “If you don’t know your past, you don’t know your future,” but Phish is a band that will never have that problem. Always self-referential Phish has consistently built upon their former work in taking their music to the next stage. In the grand scheme, they have pulled musical techniques and ideas from era to era, and on the small scale, they routinely reprise musical themes within jams and individual shows: two defining elements of Fall Tour as the band jumped into a musical style that dripped with old-school Phishiness. Teases here, reprises there, segues and musical sandwiches all became active parts of every Phish show, not to mention the superb quality of jamming. Boasting a connectedness unseen this era, Phish navigated jams with effortless fluidity and intent while injecting these pieces with new ideas and creating dense musical excursions. The retro-influence on modern Phish is undeniable, and as we move forward, it will be interesting to watch how the past continues to influence the future of the band that everyone seems to dig again.
Manchester’s outstanding version beautifully builds away from “Light’s” theme and into a series of next-level grooves. Listen for the “Alumni” funk reprise that is clearly referenced in the latter half of the jam.An outstanding cap to another ground-breaking tour for “Light.“
If Utica represented the people’s choice for the two-set show of tour, Manchester came in a close second. With action from beginning to end, bust-outs galore, and a jam-laced second set, Tuesday night in New Hampshire delivered in full. Second-set must-hear highlights include “Light,” “Makisupa > Night Nurse > Makisupa,” and “Ghost > Mango > Weekapaug.” In a classic maneuver, Phish dropped a top-shelf show right before they headed into their high-key Atlantic City run.
I: After Midnight, The Sloth, Alumni Blues > Letter to Jimmy Page > Alumni Blues, Mellow Mood, Access Me, Llama, All of These Dreams, The Curtain With, Scent of a Mule, A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing, It’s Ice, Walls of the Cave
II: Possum, Light, Mike’s Song > Simple > Makisupa Policeman > Night Nurse*> Makisupa Policeman, The Wedge, Ghost > The Mango Song > Weekapaug Groove**> Llama
E: Show of Life
*debut, Gregory Isaacs, **w/ Can’t You Hear Me Knockin Jam w/ Ghost and Night Nurse lyrical teases
A fall tour that spoke to fans new and old fused Phish’s musical styles past and present, forming a hybrid sound that seems to have caught everyone’s ear. Throughout their career, Phish’s music has always grown and changed as the band built upon their past while adding new ideas to the mix. Moving from one …
After an all-night drive to Utica, I never stopped to give Augusta’s show its proper due. So, let’s start this week with a flashback to October 19, in the college town of Augusta, Maine. Building off Charleston’s triumphant finale, Phish traveled far north to drop their second consecutive standout show, including two jams that trumped anything played through the first five shows of tour. Enclosed in a gymnasium frozen in time somewhere around 1982 – Phish juxtaposed plenty of of forward-looking music to these retro surroundings while creating two pieces that stand the test of time. During a roots-rock Americana-based opening set, Phish included diversions with a tour-highlight “Bathtub Gin” and “Divided Sky,” but the real northern lights came after setbreak…and during the encore! In a mini two-part series to begin this week, we’ll look at a two tour-defining moments that took place one night in Maine.
10/19 Poster
Jumping head first into the second set with a “Fuck Your Face” and Mike’s Song” mash-up, the band swung from their knees and ignited the second set. But when the hard-edged piece ended, one of Augusta’s extraordinary moments emerged in “Light.” Fall versions of “Light” tended toward next-generation Phish grooves – sped up and highly intricate textures – rather than the melodic and abstract sounds that characterized summer’s standouts. But in Augusta, the band not only moved through both of these sonic plateaus with fluid virtuosity, they also dipped into the cosmic soup – a brief but soulful spacescape in the vein of “Tweezer’s” ending in Miami (12.29.09). This multi-dimensional version progressed through organically morphing improv with utmost patience, one-minded connectedness, and an exploratory spirit. Landing in several segments of fully realized psychedelia, Augusta’s “Light” stood out as Fall’s top-shelf offering; a piece that flirts with the loftiest incarnations of the modern launch pad.
Locked and loaded, Trey hit a rhythm chord that ended the song’s thrilling structured jam and reset the improvisational canvas. Immediately stepping into quick collaborative rhythms, Page’s organ solo lent a darker feel to the music. Trey and Fish locked into a series of hits that engaged the band in full, moving as one into the first stage of a fluid psychedelic journey. Fusing bliss and groove, Trey offered several melodic themes that guided this four-part conversation, taking the band far away into the land of make-believe. Mike and Page formed a drone curtain for Trey and Fish’s two-part dynamic play. Moving forward, both Mike and Page oozed into patterns of their own, soon crafting a four-player game of sonic ping-pong.
10.19.2010 – Augusta, ME (Ryan Gilbertie)
Trey’s melodic leads turned spiritual, fitting perfectly within the band’s nuanced rhythmic folds, creating an interwoven quilt of musical mastery. Phish painted this passage with delicate precision while simultaneously pushing the boundaries of their modern sound – a sure sign that the state of current Phish could not be better. Passing though an abstract segment, Trey played notes that resembled a classic digital delay pattern, still speaking with melodic sensibility. As the jam grew quieter, the band transformed into a four-headed ambient monster, stepping powerfully from its lair and engulfing the music with heavy sonic sorcery. Bleeding into “Twenty Years Later,” Phish proceeded to take the song’s ominous patterns for the most significant ride of their young life, finally infusing a full-band jaunt into the dark tale; a perfect counterpart for “Light’s” intergalactic excursion.
The first show of Phish’s week in the Northeast, this intimate mid-week affair built off Charleston and catapulted the band onto Utica via stellar playing throughout and a juicy second set of highlight-strewn Phish.
I: Chalk Dust Torture, Back on the Train, Torn and Frayed, Bathtub Gin, Gumbo, The Divided Sky, Jesus Just Left Chicago, Nellie Kane, 46 Days, Possum
II: Fuck Your Face, Mike’s Song* > Light > Twenty Years Later > Fast Enough for You, Weekapaug Groove, Halley’s Comet, Free, Harry Hood, Golgi Apparatus, A Day in the Life
E: Reba, Backwards Down the Number Line
* with”Fuck Your Face” quotes at the beginning and end of the jam
Source: FOB Schoeps mk22> kc5> cmc6> psp3> mini-me@48-24>r44>sd (Tapers – Rob Adler / Dave Flaschner)
After an all-night drive to Utica, I never stopped to give Augusta’s show its proper due. So, let’s start this week with a flashback to October 19, in the college town of Augusta, Maine. Building off Charleston’s triumphant finale, Phish traveled far north to drop their second consecutive standout show, including two jams that trumped …
